Flinders Street is a main street in the

city centre A city centre is the commercial, cultural and often the historical, political, and geographic heart of a city. The term "city centre" is primarily used in British English, and closely equivalent terms exist in other languages, such as "" in Fren ...

Adelaide, South Australia Adelaide ( ) is the list of Australian capital cities, capital city of South Australia, the state's largest city and the list of cities in Australia by population, fifth-most populous city in Australia. "Adelaide" may refer to either Greater A ...

. It runs from the northern end of Victoria Square to

East Terrace, Adelaide __NOTOC__ East Terrace marks the eastern edge of the Adelaide city centre. It is one of the main north–south thoroughfares through the east side of the city. Although the terrace essentially runs north–south between North Terrace and Sout ...

. It is one of the intermediate-width streets of the Adelaide grid, at wide.Map
of the

Adelaide Adelaide ( ) is the capital city of South Australia, the state's largest city and the fifth-most populous city in Australia. "Adelaide" may refer to either Greater Adelaide (including the Adelaide Hills) or the Adelaide city centre. The dem ...

CBD,

North Adelaide North Adelaide is a predominantly residential precinct and suburb of the City of Adelaide in South Australia, situated north of the River Torrens and within the Adelaide Park Lands. History Surveyor-General Colonel William Light of the colo ...

and the

Adelaide Parklands The Adelaide Park Lands are the figure-eight of land spanning both banks of the River Torrens between Hackney and Thebarton and separating the City of Adelaide area (which includes both Adelaide city centre and North Adelaide) from the surro ...

History

The street is named after the

navigator A navigator is the person on board a ship or aircraft responsible for its navigation.Grierson, MikeAviation History—Demise of the Flight Navigator FrancoFlyers.org website, October 14, 2008. Retrieved August 31, 2014. The navigator's primar ...

and

cartographer Cartography (; from grc, χάρτης , "papyrus, sheet of paper, map"; and , "write") is the study and practice of making and using maps. Combining science, aesthetics and technique, cartography builds on the premise that reality (or an im ...

Captain

Matthew Flinders Captain Matthew Flinders (16 March 1774 – 19 July 1814) was a British navigator and cartographer who led the first inshore circumnavigation of mainland Australia, then called New Holland. He is also credited as being the first person to u ...

. On 22 November 1878 the East Adelaide Model School, later Flinders Street Public School or Flinders Street Model School, was opened in large bluestone buildings designed by E. J. Woods. A primary school occupied the premises until 1969, when the Flinders Street Adult Education Centre was established there. In 1978 it became the Flinders St School of Music, a campus of

TAFE Technical and further education or simply TAFE (), is the common name in English-speaking countries in Oceania for vocational education, as a subset of tertiary education. TAFE institutions provide a wide range of predominantly vocational cours ...

. Many churches were built on Flinders Street in the 1860s and 1870s, and several survive today. In August 2022, the

City of Adelaide The City of Adelaide, also known as the Corporation of the City of Adelaide and Adelaide City Council is a local government area in the metropolitan area of greater Adelaide, South Australia and is legally defined as the capital city of South ...

renamed a laneway off Flinders Street, behind

Adelaide Town Hall Adelaide Town Hall is a landmark building on King William Street in Adelaide, South Australia, Australia. The City of Adelaide Town Hall complex includes the Town Hall and the office building at 25 Pirie Street. Description and history Adelai ...

, Paul Kelly Lane. Previously named Pilgrim Lane after the adjacent church, the lane is now called Paul Kelly Lane. It is the fourth such renaming after musicians associated with the city, the others being

Sia Furler Sia Kate Isobelle Furler ( ; born 18 December 1975) is an Australian singer and songwriter. Born and raised in Adelaide, she started her career as a singer in the acid jazz band Crisp in the mid-1990s. In 1997, when Crisp disbanded, she re ...

, No Fixed Address, and

Cold Chisel Cold Chisel are an Australian pub rock band, which formed in Adelaide in 1973 by mainstay members Ian Moss on guitar and vocals, Steve Prestwich on drums and Don Walker on piano and keyboards. They were soon joined by Jimmy Barnes (at the ...

Historic buildings

Churches

churches on Flinders Street include: * Bethlehem Lutheran Church, at no. 170, on the corner of Sudholz Place * Flinders Street Baptist Church, at no. 65; includes manse, now Baptist Church Offices, and Mead Hall; all heritage-listed. *

Pilgrim Uniting Church Pilgrim Uniting Church is a church in the heart of the City on Flinders Street, Adelaide in South Australia. It is a church of the Uniting Church in Australia. Social justice, as articulated by the Uniting Church in Australia in the inaugural ...

, at no. 12

Other historic buildings

*Flinders Hall, originally built as school accommodation for St Paul's Church of England, sold to Hamilton Laboratories in the 1950s *Observatory House, at no. 84-86, originally built for a scientific instrument-making business run by Otto Boettger, who emigrated to South Australia from Germany in 1877 *Office of Multi-Cultural Affairs, originally the

manse A manse () is a clergy house inhabited by, or formerly inhabited by, a minister, usually used in the context of Presbyterian, Methodist, Baptist and other Christian traditions. Ultimately derived from the Latin ''mansus'', "dwelling", from '' ...

of the Stow Memorial Church (now Pilgrim), used as a sanitarium 1901–1911. before being sold to the

state government A state government is the government that controls a subdivision of a country in a federal form of government, which shares political power with the federal or national government. A state government may have some level of political autonomy, or ...

*St Paul's Church, built 1972, known as a

High Anglican The term ''high church'' refers to beliefs and practices of Christian ecclesiology, liturgy, and theology that emphasize formality and resistance to modernisation. Although used in connection with various Christian traditions, the term originate ...

church, whose congregation included many prominent families; converted into a nightclub during the 1980s; now St Paul's Creative Centre, accommodating people working in the arts and creative industries

Junction list

Footnotes

References

Streets in Adelaide {{adelaide-stub